Archives for March 2015

Have you ever had those moments in life where you’re juggling so many balls that some are bound to drop and you feel like you can only really concentrate on one or two of them? You might be juggling your full-time job, starting your virtual assistant business, family, kids, personal stuff and countless other things.

If you’ve ever felt that way (which I’m sure you have) then here are some strategies I use to move forward. First, I stop and walk away from whatever it is that’s consuming me and do something else entirely.

I might:

Take a walk

Get a hot shower

Play with my son

Drink some hot tea

Watch a show I have recorded on the DVR

Listen to some music

You don’t necessarily need to do one of these things. These are just the suggestions that work for me. Take a minute to make your own list.

Then I come back to the situation with fresh eyes.

And I make a plan. I write down everything that needs to get done and then—this is the most important part—I schedule it on my calendar. With so many things going on in my life at once, things just won’t get done if they’re not scheduled in. Then I honor myself and the schedule.

My best advice is not to jam pack and overfill that calendar or set yourself up for unrealistic goals. We all have the same 24 hours in a day. No, you can’t add more. And as I always tell people, if you could add more hours in a day, you’d fill it up with busy stuff and not the stuff that you really love to do.

So take the pressure off yourself. Schedule what’s most important, including time for yourself (even if it’s just 10 minutes).

Now it’s your turn. What advice do you have when there are too many things on your plate? What works for you? Which of these strategies are you going to try?

Hi, it’s Alicia here at newVAadvice.com and I’m back with another segment in the Getting Started series.

Today, we’re going to talk about the legalities of owning your own virtual assistant business.

It’s very likely that by now you’ve realized you have some amazing skills that you can turn into services in your VA business. But chances are, you’ve never owned your own business before and you’re not really familiar with all the legal stuff that’s involved with it.

This may be stopping you from moving forward and keeping you feeling overwhelmed. Here are some tips that might help you to get a handle on this.

First, remember that you are an independent contractor and not someone’s employee, so you need to run your business like a business. If you need more information on what it means to be an independent contractor, check out the blog post I wrote on that.

Before I go any further, I want to say that this information does not constitute legal advice. I am not an attorney, accountant or legal professional. Also, I’ll be sharing information for those based in the US, because that’s where I live and what I’m most familiar with. Before you make a decision for yourself, it’s a great idea to get professional legal advice.

Business Name

The first part in this is choosing your business name. The name that you choose can actually affect your business structure. We’ll talk more about that later.

If you want to know if a business name is available for you to use, you can check at GoDaddy or Namecheap to see if the domain name is available. Because, of course, you want to purchase that domain name, even if it’s not the main one you want to use for your website. You want to make sure that no one else uses it.

You may also need to register your business name with your state. Each state has different laws, so you need to check. I mentioned earlier that your business name can affect your business structure. For example, in the state of Pennsylvania, if your business name includes your personal name, you do not need to register the name. Let’s say your name is Mary Smith and you choose “Smith Social Media Marketing” as your business name. You can operate as a sole proprietor under your name and you’re not required to register it. Of course, you can still register it if you like.

Business Structure

Let’s get into business structure. We’ll go over some of the more common ones for service-based business owners.

Sole Proprietorship

This basically means that you are the sole owner of your business, therefore, you are personally responsible and liable for your business. As far as taxes go, you can file with your personal taxes. It’s just an extra schedule to fill out, and you keep track of income and expenses.

LLC (Limited Liability Company)

In this case, you still function very much like a sole proprietor, but without the personal liability. There is a bit more paperwork involved here. When it comes to taxes, there are a couple of different ways that you can go about it with an LLC, but you do still have the option to file with your personal taxes, like a sole proprietor would.

Corporation

In this situation, the business is a complete separate legal entity. A corporation is more complicated and involved. Taxes are handled differently and you can no longer file along with your personal taxes.

For more information, the best resource that I suggest is the US Small Business Administration’s website at SBA.gov.

That’s a brief summary of the legal aspect of starting your own virtual assistant business. As I said, it’s up to you to do your research and talk to a professional if you need to. Taking care of the legalities at the start of your business will save you time and headaches down the road.

Action Steps

Here are your actions steps for this segment:

Decide on a business name, purchase the domain name for it and find out if you need to register it.

Do your research and decide on a business structure that best fits you and your business.

Stay tuned for the next part of this series. Missed the previous segment? You can find it here. If you have questions, feel free to leave them in the comments section.

I got the idea to write this blog post from my friends in one of my mastermind groups. (Note: That’s an affiliate link.)

They pointed out this post by Paul Taubman where he gave his audience a glimpse into who he really is. Tracy Roberts suggested that we take a minute and write one of these posts so that our own community could get to know us better.

So I did just that. Here is a list of 25 things you may or may not know about me!

1. I caught the travel bug at an early age. My very first time on a plane was to Australia as part of a student ambassador program at 13 years old (without my family). Since then, I’ve been to places such as England, Amsterdam, St. Martin, Wales for a semester in college and Africa for a mission trip.

2. I need music in my life so that I can exist. I excel at rock music trivia. I know this genre from the 1950’s to today. I can name a tune within seconds of hearing the first couple of notes. But if you put me on one of those game shows, I would totally freeze up and not know a thing. I categorize this as fun but useless knowledge that takes up space in my brain but doesn’t make me any money.

3. I was born in Philadelphia and raised in the suburbs. Although I no longer have a desire to live there, that city will always be in my heart.

4. My husband and I were born (in the same year, 5 months apart) and raised about 20-30 minutes away from each other but never met until our late 20’s when we both moved away from home to the Lancaster/York area, where we also lived 20 minutes away from each other.

5. I love old planes, especially fighter planes, and love going to air shows. I’ve even met some of the crew of the Memphis Belle and got their autographs.

6. I’m left-handed, but if you look at my handwriting, it is slanted as though a right-handed person wrote it. This is because I went to Catholic school and, regardless of my left-handedness, I was taught that my writing had to look like everyone else’s.

7. I don’t really like to drive. If I could, I’d pay someone to drive me everywhere.

8. I love to read, especially memoirs. I find it inspiring and uplifting to read true stories of people beating the odds and living amazing lives.

11. I’ve always liked Lionel Richie’s music (even when it’s not cool to like him) and one of his songs is my wedding song.

12. Although I come off as extroverted, I’ve recorded many videos and have been interviewed/photographed for magazines, I have anxiety about speaking in public. I don’t like to be the center of attention—at all.

13. I’m a night person. It’s not that I’m grumpy in the morning, I’d just prefer to sleep in if given the chance.

14. I think art and creativity is a beautiful thing, and although I’m not very artistic myself, I have many friends who are. I marvel at their abilities.

15. Perfect strangers tell me their deepest secrets. It happens to me all the time—in line at the grocery store or at the mall. Someone will strike up a conversation and say, “I’ve never told anyone this before but…” Happens all the time.

16. I have one sibling, my sister. I’m the older one but people constantly ask us if we’re twins when we’re out together. I’m seven years older than her.

17. When I was a kid, I collected stamps and postcards from all over the world. It goes back to that love of traveling thing.

18. I love scrapbooking. I don’t have as much time for it as I used to, but I just love preserving memories. I’m the crazy picture-taking lady at all the parties/events (and pretty much any moment that my child does something cute…or just breathes).

19. I’m afraid of haunted houses, fun houses and haunted roller coasters. I know—I’m a grown woman, but you won’t get me in any of them!

20. I hate blue pens. This goes back to my Catholic school days. We were only allowed to write with a certain brand of blue erasable pen. But because I’m left-handed, my hand drags over everything I write. That would always smear my work and then I’d get in trouble for handing in messy work. I only write with black pens now.

21. I was very much a child of the 80’s. I had a Walkman, a boom box, Cabbage Patch Kids, leg warmers, and I loved New Kids on the Block.

22. I am a people person. I love getting to know people. I also enjoy learning about different cultures and customs. I graduated college with a BA in Sociology and a minor in Anthropology, so that makes sense.

24. I love gardening. I’m not particularly fabulous with plants and flowers, but I like being outside and digging in the earth. Being close to nature helps me to feel close to God.

25. I’ve always been a hard worker, giving 100% to whatever I do. But starting my own business and having a baby at the same time is the hardest thing I’ve ever done—and the most rewarding.

There you have it. I hope this gave you a chance to get to know me a little better. Do you have questions about anything? Did this make you want to write one of these posts for your own blog? If so, let me know when you write it. Feel free to mention it in the comments section below and link to it.